We recently came across the work of illustrator and designer Jacek Matysiak, and were so impressed that we knew we wanted to share it with you. Jacek is based in Dublin, Ireland, and his work provides a unique window onto the natural world. We caught with him recently to find out more.

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Freshwater Blog: Your illustration and design work is focused on images of the natural world — what inspired you to take this direction? And how did you get started?

Jacek Matysiak: I grew up in a town that was surrounded by beautiful lakes, rivers and conifer forests; the proximity to nature and ease of access have eventually given me some ideas to capture the mood of wilderness in a more creative and artistic way. I was initially more drawn to photography but eventually discovered the medium of illustration and started to enjoy it much more, as it gave me broader opportunities.

FB: There are some iconic freshwater animals in your portfolio — arowana, pike and osprey to name three. What draws you to aquatic environments, and what are some of the challenges and opportunities of depicting them?

JM: I have spent most of my life near freshwater environments, and heading to a fishing weekend trip, kayaking on a lake or spending a day out in a forest is a common activity throughout most of the year. Naturally you would be observing creatures like freshwater fish, majestic birds of prey and mammals that came up close to the water.

The biggest challenge is to avoid creating very generic images in your art. I see a lot of good work that is depicted in a very realistic and nearly scientific way. Even though I want to achieve a certain degree of accuracy, I also strive to give my characters more cartoon-like features and stylize them in a particular way.

FB: What is your process? Do you undertake fieldwork, or work largely in the studio? What are your tools and materials?

JM: It is a combination of both really. Whenever I can afford it, I do spend a lot of time in the wild and try to capture the look and feel of the environment, observing the landscape, taking various photographs and doing quick sketches but sometimes I inevitably have to rely on other resources.

I work at home or sometimes in a cafe. For sketching I use mainly pencils, color pencils and lately posca pens. For finished work I complete my artwork largely in Illustrator and often do some additional coloring and add textures in Photoshop.

FB: Tell us about Obscure Cycle — your book about the eel life cycle. What drew you to this fascinating creature, and how did you go about depicting it?

JM: As you say, an eel is such a phenomenal creature that it simply creates a great story on its own. Last year I was very eager to do a small picture book about a fish, and initially had a pike in mind, but eventually went for an eel, as there is so much more to write about it.

The book is constructed in a form of a loop, with the beginning and end in the Sargasso Sea, depicting eel’s treacherous journey. I wanted people to find out more about eels and stop dismissing them as ugly and creepy cadaver eaters. It is also important that people understand how endangered eels are and how serious the problem of glass eel trafficking is.

You write on your website that you put a ‘strong emphasis on vivid and lively colors, highlighting the beauty and diversity of our planet.’ What role can the creative arts play in highlighting (and even helping address) environmental problems?

Art is a brilliant form of expression and I think it can help bridge the gap between the scientific and common perception of natural environment. Through the use of appealing and powerful images we can reach a much broader audience that we normally would and engage people of different ages in understanding the key environmental issues.

Regional flood discharge trends in Europe range from an increase of around 11% per decade to a decrease of 23%. The study authors identify three European regions where flooding has either increased or decreased over the study period.

Regional patterns of flooding change

Increasing autumn and winter rainfall – and the resulting wetter soils – over the last 50 years in northwestern Europe has caused an increase in flooding. Around 69% of river flow stations in this region show an increasing flood trend, with an average local increase of flow of 2.3% per decade.

In medium and large catchments in southern Europe, floods are decreasing because of lower rainfall and increasing evaporation from the soil. However, in some Mediterranean areas, small rivers can experience more floods due to frequent thunderstorms and alterations to their catchments, such as deforestation. In this region, around 74% of stations show a decreasing flood trend, with a regional average decrease in flow of 5% per decade.

In Eastern Europe, flood levels are decreasing due to less extensive spring snow cover, a shift to rainfall (rather than snow), and earlier snowmelt as a result of higher air temperatures. However, extreme precipitation in the summer has increased in the summer in this region. Here, around 78% of stations show a decreasing flood trend, with an average decrease in flow of 6% per decade.

Joint lead author of the study, Professor Günter Blöschl of the Vienna University of Technology, says: “We already knew that climate change is shifting the timing of floods in a year, but the key question had been, ‘Does climate change also control the magnitude of flood events?’. Our study did in fact find there are consistent patterns of flood change across Europe and these are in line with predicted climate change impacts, such as a contrast between increasing severity of flooding in the north and decreases in the south.”

Jamie Hannaford of the UK‘s Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, one of the scientists who was involved in the research, says: “This timely study adds to a growing body of evidence that shows that flood magnitude has increased in the UK over the last five decades, particularly in parts of northern and western Britain.

“We show this is part of a continent-wide pattern of changes in flooding which is in line with what we may expect in a warming world. This highlights the importance of long-term hydrological monitoring and the benefits of data sharing and collaboration at a European scale in order to better understand the mechanisms behind observed changes in flooding.”

Flood risk management

The research team’s results have implications for flood risk management in European river catchments. River managers often use the ‘return period’ concept to model how often floods of a certain size (and impact) will recur in their catchments.

The study authors highlight that in regions with increasing flood discharges, the 100-year flood discharge of 50 years ago now has a return period shorter than 100 years. In other words, large floods now be expected more regularly. As a result, the flood defences built to mitigate the risk of extreme flooding may no longer be sufficient.

In contrast, in regions where flooding is decreasing (such as Eastern Europe), the return period of large floods is increasing. The authors estimate that large floods which happened only once every 100 years, will now have a 125 to 250 year return period.

The study authors suggest that changing patterns of flood risk driven by climate change across Europe must be taken seriously by policy makers in order to mitigate the potential devastating impact on affected communities.

Dr Neil Macdonald of the University of Liverpool, a co-author of the study, says: “Flood management must adapt to the realities of our changing climate and associated flood risk over the coming decades.”

Dr Thomas Kjeldsen of the University of Bath, another co-author, adds: “Incorporating the evidence of increasing flood risk into engineering design and general flood management would ensure we are better prepared for future changes – a point also raised in the UK Government’s National Flood Resilience Review.”

On a hot Saturday in June I rolled up at the UK’s National Water Sport Centre. The place was abuzz with cars, kayaks, club flags and paddle-carrying athletes chatting bucket starts, heats, duck tape and Nelos. Everyone was readying to race on a highly engineered stretch of freshwater. It looked and felt a world apart from my world of conservation science and policy. Yet walking along with my daughter to get her kayak weighed, I spied a Wildlife Trusts flag and two fellow conservationists raising awareness of biosecurity and invasive species.

Gemma Rose and Helen Carter-Emsell work for North Wales Wildlife Trust, and had made the 120 mile journey to Nottingham to promote good conservation practices among kayakers. Gemma explained that the River Dee, which rises in Snowdonia and flows into the sea near Chester on the Welsh / English border, is rich in native wildlife but also hugely popular with canoeists.

“Invasive species represent a key threat to the Dee river system, and we are worried that people who use rivers for recreational activities such as canoeing have the potential to bring in invasive species and also transport ours to other river systems. The Welsh Government share these concerns and fund the Trust’s ‘Our River Wellbeing Project’ within the Dee catchment,” Gemma said.

“Fragments of crassula or balsam seeds can get inside the boat and lodge under seats and foot pumps, on paddles, spray decks and clothes,” explained Helen. “We are asking kayakers to check clean and dry their boat and kit after races, so they don’t transfer invasive species from river to river. We want to protect our native species.”

The ‘check, clean, dry’ message.

The ‘check, clean and dry’ message emblazoned on the awareness materials was clear and simple, and Gemma and Helen’s dedication to spray washing kayaks provide a practical demonstration of what was needed. However, adopting this practice didn’t seem that straightforward to the kayakers whose ways I had come to know a little in my role as a ‘supportive Dad’.

I wandered back through the throng of competitors and supporters to the Falcon club’s gazebo overlooking the race water. I slumped into a camping chair next to Keith Long, another Dad and a keystone volunteer for the club, and together we worked through what it would take to reduce the risk of canoeists spreading invasive species from river to river.

The first thing to mention is that canoeing is both a sport and a leisure pastime. Many people own their own leisure canoes, but the focus of our discussion was the club and sporting aspect of the hobby. This is organised into three disciplines: sprint, slalom and marathon. The first two are Olympic disciplines and are centred around purpose-built facilities.

Marathon is the popular every-day club sport with regular races organised and hosted by different clubs. Transporting kayaks from river-to-canal-to-river system is part of marathon racing and this is where the greatest risk of transferring invasive species lies.

Parked behind us was the club trailer. Keith told how he can transport 22 kayaks on the trailer and another 4 on his van roof if need be. “At marathon races we are parked up on grass fields. There are a hundred or more boats and no wash down facilities,” Keith pointed out. “People get home from races tired and cold, so they just shove their kayak in the boat shed and take it out for the next training session.”

Working though the practicalities of ‘check, clean and dry’ we agreed that realistically this could only happen back at a club, but this would require a facility to ensure that any washed-off invasive species do not enter the local watercourse. It wasn’t hard to come up with a design – a rectangular trough filled with different grades of gravel, wiring for a couple of spray washers, and fixed boat supports.

Although the costs of installing wash-down facilities wouldn’t be massive it would be beyond the means of most clubs. Controlling invasive species is clearly a public good, and this should be something government agencies should support.

Conservationists from the Wildlife Trusts at the National Water Sport Centre. Image: Paul Jepson

The next challenge would be to get kayakers to adopt the practice of washing down boats and equipment after they have travelled between river systems. We discussed the possibility of juniors doing this as way to build awareness ‘youth-up’ and at the same time install values of volunteering and ‘giving back’ that are so important in club and community life. “Give them the opportunity to use a spray washer!” exclaimed Keith. “They’d love it – under proper supervision of course!”

Responding to an early version of this blog, a colleague from the Environment Agency pointed out that there are battery-powered spray-washers. This opens the possibility of washing down kayaks on riverbanks after racing, which is the ideal from a biosecurity perspective. One option would be for race committees to introduce a biosecurity check after races. Kayakers are required to go through a boat check for buoyancy and numbers ahead of racing so this would represent an extension of current practice. However, host clubs need to mobilise nine to twelve volunteers in shifts to run the pre-race checks. Adding a more time consuming and messy second boat check would likely beyond the volunteer capacity of most clubs.

Equally problematic is the last component of the ‘check, clean, dry’ message. Gemma was keen to stress that leaving boats to dry in UV light for 48 hours was the surest way to kill off hitchhiking non-native species. Unfortunately, most kayakers lack the space and security to leave boats outside and UV light can weaken their construction. I asked Lucy Bagnall from Kirton Kayaks for an expert opinion on this last point. She explained that, “racing kayaks are increasingly constructed from epoxy resins that bind well with carbon fibres but can become unstable when exposed to UV-light. This is why manufacture’s warranties and care guidelines state that boats should not be left in the sun.”

Richard Atkinson, Waterways and Environment Policy Officer with British Canoeing commented, “Invasive species are top of my list of policy priorities. We have just begun our journey of engaging canoers in practice to reduce this. We are still working through practicalities and ways to engage the clubs. Our partnership with the Wildlife Trusts is a great step. As well as kayakers to adopt biosecurity practices we are also mobilising canoers to help in the removal of invasive species such as pennywort and clear up plastic debris.”

Driving home I reflected on the notion of policy engagement and how this needs to be a journey of co-learning where policy professionals move beyond simple awareness messages to actively research and embrace the culture and practices of those whose behaviours they seek to influence. There are several points of alignment between kayaking life and good biosecurity practice. But there are also very real points of divergence. As my daughter noted, “We all know that its best to wash gunk and salt of our boats after races. But when you get off the water exhausted and with numb hands it’s the last thing you want to do!”

The control of invasive species is a public good and this places a responsibility on competent government agencies to provide the resources and finance to work with canoe clubs to co-design a practical approach to aquatic biosecurity.

The River Taff in South Wales. Whilst salmon and otters are returning to this river – once highly polluted by industrial discharge – ‘legacy pollutants’ may be hampering its ecological recovery. Image: Judy Davies | Flickr Creative Commons

Fred Windsor, lead author of the new study, explained: “Despite major success in controlling sewage pollution in South Wales’ rivers over the last three decades, something appears to be holding back biological recovery.” Windsor, a doctoral student at Cardiff University, continued: “Our investigations show that persistent contaminants might be responsible as they still occur widely in invertebrates, particularly in urban river environments.”

Windsor and colleagues sampled eighteen sites across the Taff, Usk and Wye catchments in South Wales. They found that sites in urban locations had damaged food chains and fewer invertebrate species compared to more rural rivers.

Water quality and ecological health has been dramatically improved on these rivers since the 1970s, when over 70% of South Wales rivers were classified as ‘grossly polluted’ due to a combination of poor sewage treatment, colliery waste and industrial discharge.

However, writing in the journal Water Research, Windsor and colleagues suggest that the toxic pollutants from this era still persist in urban rivers, hampering efforts to continue their ecological recovery.

Co-author Professor Charles Tyler, from the University of Exeter’s School of Biosciences, explained: “These apparent effects of what we call ‘legacy’ pollutants – PCBs, flame retardants, organochlorine pesticides and other complex organic chemicals that have now been largely discontinued from production and use – are yet another reminder that we continue to live with problems caused by toxic chemicals from past decades. These chemicals still occur widely in rivers, lakes and seas in Britain and beyond, and still affect a wide range of animals.”

The research team found that river food webs at the most highly contaminated urban sites had a lower diversity of species and ecological functions, compared to less contaminated sites. Food webs at contaminated sites had a simplified structure, and a reduced abundance in prey important for apex predators such as the dipper.

Co-author Professor Steve Ormerod of Cardiff University’s School of Biosciences and Water Research Institute summarised: “Urban river ecosystems in Britain have been on an improving trajectory since at least 1990, but there is still a way to go before we can say that they’ve wholly recovered from well over a century of industrial and urban degradation.

“The ecological pressures on our rivers are multiple, ranging from combined sewer overflows to engineering modifications, and this research adds a new dimension to understanding why they’re not yet at their best,” Ormerod said.

“The slow degradation of some pollutants means that we may have to wait a long time before these chemicals disappear. Perhaps one of the lessons is that we should avoid ecosystem damage in the first place rather than try to solve problems after they occur.”

Freshwater ecosystems are often key parts of our everyday landscapes: whether ponds, lakes, rivers, wetlands and canals that we might cross and pass by regularly. However, glimpsing the life that goes on below the surface of freshwaters can often be challenging, even to the most regular visitors.

Some creative artists have used film to shed a light on underwater lives, whilst others have used sound to ‘eavesdrop’ on their aural worlds. Since 2010, Swiss artist Michel Roggo has been using photography to explore and document global freshwater habitats through his Freshwater Project. Roggo’s work has taken him to more than 40 freshwater ecosystems across the world, each containing unique and unusual biodiversity and geology.

Speaking to The Freshwater Blog about the project in 2014, Roggo said: “We know what coral reefs look like, but what about the creeks, streams, lakes and ponds on our doorstep? I’m always looking for new and interesting scenes with the most dramatic light. A marsh pond, beneath the ice in a mountain stream, among algae – these habitats are hardly ever seen but they are incredibly beautiful.”

For Roggo, shooting photographs in freshwater habitats offers two key opportunities. First, as sub-surface freshwater life is remarkably overlooked by most creative practitioners, Roggo’s explorations in The Freshwater Project offer new perspectives on spectacular and unusual underwater landscapes. For Roggo this is the process of “searching for this magic moment under the surface, with the perfect light and composition.” Roggo’s photographs are largely taken with remote-controlled submerged cameras, and he rarely dons diving gear in his explorations.

The project is also intended to have positive conservation impacts. Roggo has partnered with the IUCN Freshwater Programme to provide images which celebrate the unseen beauty and diversity of global freshwater systems, and highlight the pressures they face.

“As one of the few professional photographers specialising in underwater images of freshwater landscapes and species we strongly support Michel’s work,” said Dr. Will Darwall, Head of the IUCN Freshwater Biodiversity Unit. “We see the need for raising public awareness of the beauty of underwater freshwater habitats and species through images such as these as a most important contribution to IUCN’s own work towards valuing and conserving nature.”

A new exhibition at the Zoological Museum at the University of Zurich in Roggo’s home country of Switzerland brings together over 900 of his photographs, documenting what the curators call ‘a beautiful underwater world awash with light’. The photographs in ‘AQUA’ – created in collaboration with local guides, including members of indigenous peoples, biologists, dive guides, skippers and pilots – document global locations including Lake Baikal, the Sense river, and the Iguazú Falls.

The Zurich exhibition is organised into five themes, where freshwaters are variously: dynamic habitats; challenging ecosystems which foster unique biodiversity; water sources in glaciers and ice caps; water sources in groundwaters; and geological agents of erosion and transport. The result is a diverse and beautiful collection of animals, plants, ice, rock and water sources across the world.

Roggo’s exploration of the glaciers and polar ice caps – where around two-thirds of the world’s freshwater is stored – led him to the ends of the earth, from the Ross Ice Shelf in Antarctica to the glaciers of Greenland.

“Michel Roggo has put together an impressive record of the most important freshwater habitats on Earth,” said Isabel Klusman, Head of the Zoological Museum. “This is a key step in raising awareness for these fragile and often endangered domains.” The AQUA exhibition opens on 23rd July, and is accompanied by a new book featuring a selection of 360 photographs from the Freshwater Project.

A juvenile Beluga sturgeon – or sterlet – bred to restock the Danube River as part of the MEASURES project. Image: Daniel Trauner | MEASURES

The Danube River is one of Europe’s most diverse and important freshwater systems. Sturgeons are flagship animals in the Danube catchment: iconic migratory species, which have existed since the time of dinosaurs, and are symbolic of the Danube’s historical heritage and ecological wealth.

However, the ability of sturgeon populations to migrate through the Danube catchment to spawn and feed has been restricted by human activities such as habitat destruction, dam construction and overfishing. According to the IUCN, 85% of global sturgeon species are threatened with extinction, making them the most endangered species group in the world.

MEASURES is a major new project which aims to manage and restore ecological corridors in the Danube River basin in an effort to boost populations of the six sturgeon species. Funded by the EU as part of the Danube Transnational Programme, MEASURES aims to improve habitat quality and connectivity along the Danube, not only to benefit sturgeon species, but also other migratory fish and the wider aquatic biodiversity in the basin, too.

The MEASURES team. Image: MEASURES

Cross-border collaboration for sturgeon conservation in Europe

The start of the MEASURES project follows the signing of the Pan-European Sturgeon Action Plan in November last year. The Action Plan covers eight European sturgeon species, seven of which are listed as critically endangered on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. It provides the first ever fish-specific action plan implemented as an EU Directive.

MEASURES is a collaboration between twelve partners across the Danube region, led by the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences (BOKU) in Vienna, Austria. The participation of a wide range of stakeholders in the project – national authorities, international organisations, academic and research institutions, and NGOs – offers MEASURES significant potential in developing conservation and restoration strategies throughout the Danube basin.

Co-operation across national borders is crucial in providing effective conservation schemes for migratory fish such as the sturgeon. Sturgeons have long lifespans (some species can live for 150 years), and most species migrate vast distances across diverse habitats at different stages of their lives. This potentially makes them ‘umbrella’ species for the conservation of other species, who may also benefit from habitat restoration and re-connection designed for sturgeon populations.

There are three key aspects to the MEASURES project. Over the next three years, project researchers will identify and map migratory fish habitats along the Danube basin. This will allow for a harmonised and improved strategy to re-connect migratory fish habitats.

Such ‘ecological corridors’ will be re-established and brought into policy and management plans in the Danube basin. Finally, a strategy to secure the dramatically declined Danube sturgeon species will be developed, including the design of appropriate broodstock facilities and conservation stocking approaches basin-wide.

Research, mapping, dialogue and outreach

An accessible online information system containing maps of species habitats and distributions, alongside articles, reports and multimedia will be created within the project, led by the Institute of Biology, at the Romanian Academy, Bucharest. A series of workshops designed to improve national and transnational dialogue and co-operation among researchers and different stakeholders across the Danube basin will be facilitated over the project life-span.

Migratory fish habitats will be mapped along the Danube basin (activity led by the Danube Delta National Institute for Research and Development), using historical data and contemporary maps, which will be ‘field tested’ through on-site ecological measurements and fishing activities. This work will produce a migratory fish ‘Habitat Mapping Manual’ which provides information on the identification, habitat, distribution, historical trends and contemporary threats to migratory species.

Newly released sterlets. Image: Thomas Friedrich | MEASURES

Genetic conservation and re-stocking

Genetic conservation is a key issue in MEASURES, and breeding and restocking programmes will be led by the National Agricultural Research and Innovation Centre, Research Institute for Fisheries in Hungary, who will produce a ‘Genetic Conservation Manual’ detailing the process. Restockings of two key species have already taken place in April 2019, with 3000 juvenile sterlets released in Hungary, and 1000 Russian sturgeons released in Romania.

A second round of re-stockings are planned for the autumn as part of a public event. Cutting-edge methods for detecting the presence of rare Danube sturgeon using eDNA testing in river water will be deployed together with the Joint Danube Survey organized by the ICPDR.

“Conservational restocking is one of many necessary actions to save endangered fish. In conjunction with the provision and restoration of habitat it is essential to increase the number of animals of species and populations on the very brink of extinction”, says Thomas Friedrich, an aquatic scientist from BOKU.

A new Strategy for the Danube Ecological Corridor

The activities will be brought together at the end of the MEASURES project by BOKU in a ‘Strategy for the Danube Ecological Corridor’, which will focus on habitat connectivity as a key policy and management issue. Overall, the project will significantly advance our understanding of the Danube basin, the interdependence of sturgeon species and their freshwater habitats, and the threats they face.

There is significant Europe-wide appetite for co-operation and collaboration in conserving and restoring for sturgeons. We will follow the progress of MEASURES, and related projects, over the coming months and years.

Glass eels from the River Shannon estuary in Ireland. Image: European Eel Foundation

The European eel is one of the most fascinating and mysterious freshwater fish in the world. Its lifecycle takes place across vast oceans: mature eels spawn in the Sargasso Sea in the North Atlantic, and their larvae drift on ocean currents for nearly a year towards European shores. When approaching the coastline, the larvae metamorphosise into a transparent ‘glass eels’ a few centimetres long. These glass eels enter river estuaries, grow into ‘elvers’ and begin migrating upstream.

Eels can take decades to reach maturity in freshwater rivers and lakes, before migrating downstream back out into the open ocean as adults to spawn. This remarkable spawning cycle has yet to be fully documented by scientists.

European eel populations are in severe decline. According to the IUCN, the number of eels entering European catchments has declined by 90% since the 1970s. This is partly due to obstructions such as dams, weirs and hydropower plants blocking the eels’ migration routes, and the loss of spawning habitats such as wetlands across Europe.

Operation Elver – a major 2018 operation by EUROPOL and SEPRONA to tackle illegal eel trafficking.

Clearly, there are many pressures on European eel populations at all stages of its lifecycle. However, recent evidence shows the increasing impact of illegal fishing and trafficking as a major factor in European eel declines. Whilst the export of European eels out of the European Union has been suspended since 2010, between 300 to 350 million eels – as much as 100 tonnes of fish – are illegally trafficked from Europe to Asia each year, according to EUROPOL. This figure accounts for around one-quarter of the total number of glass eels reaching the European coastline each year.

“Trafficking of the European eel is the world’s great wildlife crime in both traded individuals and market value. It affects 25% of the total stock of European Eel and is hampering the recovery of this precious species,” said Andrew Kerr, Chairman of the Sustainable Eel Group. “It is therefore vital that we stop all smuggling because it undermines every single effort used to establish adequate protection from other human impacts.”

Suitcases full of glass eels confiscated in Spain during ‘Operation Elver’ in 2018. Image: EUROPOL

Eels are a culinary delicacy in China and Japan, but when supplies of Japanese eels declined in the 1990s, Asian eel farming shifted to using European eels. Wildlife traffickers have responded to this demand by setting up illegal trade routes transporting live glass eels caught in estuaries across Europe to Asia.

The tiny eels are often smuggled in suitcases – each containing up to 50,000 fish – and transported by road and air to Asia. Here, they are grown on in fish farms to their full size. Because of the complexity of their lifecycle, European eels cannot be commercially bred in captivity, fostering the demand for glass eels which can be harvested and transported in huge numbers.

Where a glass eel might cost a euro to buy, a fully grown eel can be sold for ten times as much. This profit margin has led to an illegal trade in European eels estimated to be worth €3 billion each year. This trade has been called ‘the world’s greatest, yet least known, wildlife crime’ by the Sustainable Eel Group.

Eel is a delicacy in Chinese and Japanese cuisine. Image: Little MiMi | Pixabay Creative Commons

A press conference held last week in London announced that increasing law enforcement efforts to curb illegal eel trafficking have seized 15 million eels and made 153 arrests across the EU since last year. This figure represents a 50% rise in arrests compared to the year before. Convened at the Sustainable Eel Group’s 10 Year Anniversary Event, the press conference featured representatives from EUROPOL, the UK National Wildlife Crime Unit and Spain’s Nature Protection Service (SEPRONA), who are collaborating on the issue across Europe.

“This is our flagship operation in terms of environmental crime. All the arrests mentioned are in Europe with the majority from Spain, France and Portugal. The main actions have been taken from SEPRONA, they have led the way in Europe along with the Portuguese and French authorities,” said Jose Antonio Alfaro Moreno from EUROPOL.

“The people arrested in Europe are poachers, mules and members from other criminal networks. We have focused not just looking at trafficking glass eels as a single issue, but the wider criminal networks,” Moreno continued. “Year after year, more countries are joining our actions. For example, this year we are carrying out more work in Croatia, Czech Republic, Germany, Switzerland and Macedonia. For the next season, we want to follow the line of the inquiry into eel meat production in Asia and DNA traces. With this, we expect more countries to get involved with high ambition for action. The criminal groups learn and develop their methods, so EUROPOL need to stay one step ahead.”

A 2016 study used DNA barcoding to prove that glass eels seized at Hong Kong International Airport were sourced in Europe, providing the first genetic evidence of the illegal eel trade between Europe and Asia. Advances in such technologies have the potential to support enforcement and prosecution, as well as facilitate international co-operation between European and Asian countries on the issue, the study – led by Florian Stein from the Technische Universität Braunschweig, Germany – suggests.

Earlier this year, researchers announced a new DNA testing method to identify illegally trafficked European eels, which has already led to the arrest and prosecution of smugglers in Hong Kong. The test – which is quick and costs around $1 dollar to administer – can identify a species from a meat sample, living specimen or even from environmental DNA in the water used to transport live eels. “This test works for anything with DNA,” said marine scientist Demian Chapman, one of the developers of the testing method. “The endgame for us is that this technology will be at every border checkpoint in the world.”

For now, European eel populations remain critically endangered across the continent, as these fascinating and mysterious fish are impacted by multiple pressures. The hope is that attempts to curb illegal smuggling of glass eels will complement wider conservation efforts to re-connect migration routes and restore habitats for eel populations.

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Features, interviews and analyses on freshwater conservation, science and policy.

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